Trump’s Iran Derangement Is Getting Worse

Trump boasted about reimposed sanctions on Iran in an early morning tweet:

The Iran sanctions have officially been cast. These are the most biting sanctions ever imposed, and in November they ratchet up to yet another level. Anyone doing business with Iran will NOT be doing business with the United States. I am asking for WORLD PEACE, nothing less!

The president’s boast conveys the irrationality and absurdity of U.S. Iran policy very well. He brags about imposing the harshest sanctions ever when U.S. leverage with Iran is much less than it was a few years ago, he implicitly threatens all of Iran’s trading partners with severe penalties for conducting perfectly legal commerce with Iran, and then pretends that waging economic war on multiple countries has something to do with peace. Trump’s Iran derangement seems to be getting progressively worse.

The sanctions are being reimposed on Iran because of Trump’s purely destructive decision to renege on a successful nonproliferation agreement that all of the other parties acknowledge to be working as intended. This crisis is entirely of Trump’s own making, and he bears the blame for it. For the sake of following through on a senseless decision, Trump is damaging relations with many of our allies and largest trading partners in a vain bid to compel Iran to accept the administration’s preposterous demands.

The administration is treating Iran unjustly, but beyond that it is creating rifts and tensions between the U.S. and the rest of the world’s major economic powers for no good reason. The Iran obsession has nothing to do with advancing American interests and it is putting unnecessary strain on U.S. relationships with some of our closest allies. Trump’s incessant unreasonable demands to other countries over their ties with Iran are making the U.S. less influential and easier to ignore.

about the author

Daniel Larison is a senior editor at TAC, where he also keeps a solo blog. He has been published in the New York Times Book Review, Dallas Morning News, World Politics Review, Politico Magazine, Orthodox Life, Front Porch Republic, The American Scene, and Culture11, and was a columnist for The Week. He holds a PhD in history from the University of Chicago, and resides in Lancaster, PA. Follow him on Twitter.

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